A new epidemic has struck the human race. The virus spreads through coughs and sneezes and infects the people around. Due to the recurrent sneezing, many of the infected is suffering from fatal hemorrhages. As a result, millions of peoples are losing their life without any medication as the virus is resistance to drug and it mutates very fast. The rise in the death toll adds points to the account of the players of Plague Inc. The purpose of this game is to spread a disease that communicates first and exterminate maximum number of people to gain points that help them to win.
The players in this game, exploits the vulnerabilities like climatic condition, population and poverty rate, which helps the infection to spread extensively, without giving any scope to the inhabitants to be cured. This game was actually designed around risks like antibiotic resistance. Plague Inc. game is available on iPad, iPhone and Android. This game is created by James Vaughan, who served as a consultant for Accenture in London. It initially started as an innovative side project for the game lovers. With the help of various programmers and other experts who helped him with the sound effects, art and creativity of the game, he completed the project in less than $5,000.
No educational value was attached to the game during the initial phase of the game. But over time, this game is seen as a way of raising awareness among the citizens about the pandemic risks. Since the release of the game, more than 15 million downloads, have been reported. It has appealed the game lovers and public health officials equally. According to W. Ian Lipkin, director of Columbia University’s Center for Infection and Immunity, at times of financial crunch, this game can help to aware the citizens who are not interested about science. In the fiscal year 2013, U.S. National Institutes of Health had to reduce 5% from its annual budget.
In March 2013, the researchers in Atlanta of U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention collaborated with Vaughan, and it was agreed that the name of CDC would appear in the mock news alerts of the game. The CDC spokesman, Dave Daigle stated that generally public health is ignored, unless something is seriously wrong. So, these alerts will help to cater information related to public health. CDC has made attempts earlier to reach out to the younger generation through social media. This year, they had built an iPad game name Solve the Outbreak, where the disease detectives have to find the cause of the outbreak of infection. This game is based on the outbreak of infections that have been investigated by CDC.
Again in 2011, they had posted on their blog, Public Health Matters, the ways to cope with Zombie apocalypse. It was noticed that the kids, who were otherwise not interested for preparing themselves for natural calamities like a tornado or hurricane, has asked their parents to store food, water, medicine and other provisions for the attack of undead. Recently, Vaughan has stated that he is getting tweets and messages on Facebook from people of all age groups, especially the parents have mentioned that their children now show interest in knowing about different countries and its different features.